


Words Are Empty Air

by Jenni_Snake



Series: Imagine Sisyphus Happy [3]
Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Angst, Drama, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, M/M, allusions to past trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-24
Updated: 2013-08-24
Packaged: 2017-12-24 11:11:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/939296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jenni_Snake/pseuds/Jenni_Snake
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An attempt to deal with past trauma ends up contributing to instead of helping Newton deal with his problems.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Words Are Empty Air

**Author's Note:**

> Short background: post-film, Hermann is working at UC Berkeley, Newton is on sabbatical.
> 
> Can be read alone, but set in the same universe as _[All I Want](http://archiveofourown.org/works/912464/chapters/1768411)_. (I will eventually start ordering these into a series, but the current stories are not yet sequential, and I'm worried about messing with AO3 too much.)

The stale coffee wasn’t helping Hermann’s bad mood. Neither was the fact that it was stale because Newton had made it when he had woken up at five that morning. The mug nearly slipped out of his hands as Hermann took it from the microwave, and he dropped it, spilling its contents into the sink.

“Shit, Hermann, are you okay?” Newton asked, half getting up from his stool on the other side of the counter.

“I’m fine,” he replied sourly, wiping his hands with a dishtowel. “In fact, I should be the one asking you the same question.”

Newton rubbed his jaw with his hands. Hermann didn’t understand why Newton, not having anywhere to be, hadn’t gone back to bed, so his tiredness was grating on his nerves.

“No, what?” Newton stammered. “Huh? No, I’m good. Good.”

Hermann gripped the edge of the counter by the sink. He had tried, he told himself, he had tried his best, but it had been the fifth time he had asked the question tactfully, gently, and had had it brushed off every time. One breath wasn’t enough to steady himself, and he gave up after the second.

“I don’t think you are,” he said, practically biting the words as they came out of his mouth.

“What?” Newton squinted, defeated. “Oh. Yeah. All… yeah... that… No, you’re right. But I’m working on it.”

It irked Hermann to have to be the one to force the issue, to be the instigator in what shouldn’t have had to feel like a war. He hadn't want to bring this up, he just wanted things to resolve themselves on their own, for everything to get better, to not be tied to a problem. A cold wave of disgust at himself trickled through his body at the thought.

“Are you?” he asked.

Newton blinked.

“What?”

“Are you? Working on it, that is?”

The tiredness seemed to disappear from Newton’s face, and his eyes clouded.

“Yes,” he stated defensively. “Yes I am, Hermann. You want a transcript or something?”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“No?” Newton snapped. “No? So then what did you mean, Hermann?”

It was uncomfortable to hear his name said so accusatorially. He played with an invisible speck of dust on the counter, trying to remember why he had brought it up.

"I’m… I’m just worried about you. For you. I’m concerned that you dropped your therapist."

Breathing heavily, clenching and unclenching fists, Newton stood up from his stool, but seemed to be at a loss as to where to go next. Hermann persevered, despite the nagging feeling that he should leave well enough alone.

"I'm just worried that you haven't found another one yet, and that you might just keep pushing it off. And I know you don’t want to hear it, but I don’t want it to become a pattern of you backing out of this, because I know it’s hard."

At that, Newton's agitation reached its limit.

"You don't know anything!" he shouted, pressing his thumb over his left eye, trying to calm himself, but unable to stop a large tear falling down his face.

"I know it’s difficult to hear…"

"Shut up, Hermann! You want to know why I stopped going to see him? Do you? I didn’t want to tell you because you seem to be very happy living in your own little world. But you want to know? Fine!

"I did it because," he continued even though his voice was cracking and fading, "because, lucky me, I somehow found the one last psychologist in the Bay Area who is a holdover from thirty years ago - someone who asked me, who had the gall to ask me if my relationship with you wasn’t just all in my head because of what happened to me.

"That if I hadn’t - if my - " he faltered, unable to bring himself to name the scars from his past, so left it unsaid but understood, " - then I wouldn’t have... ended up... ‘this way’."

He motioned between himself and Hermann, and Hermann's heart dropped. Newton continued, tears coating his speech.

"And I didn’t need that - I didn’t need to hear that the only good thing I have going for me at the moment might be a mistake, and I didn’t want to tell you because I didn’t really know how that would make you feel and I didn’t want to weigh you down with my shit."

There was nothing more that Newton could say. The revelation had hit Hermann like a blow, and he covered his mouth with his hand, watching, devastated, as Newton hugged himself tightly, oblivious to, or incapable of dealing with the tears streaming down his face.

"I probably say this too often," Herman said quietly, "but I’m sorry. I’m so sorry."

Having hooked his cane on the edge of the counter, he left it there and limped around the counter to where Newton stood, collapsed in upon himself. Herman held a hand out tentatively, placing it on his shoulder.

"May I?"

There was no response, but Newton didn't back away, so Hermann slowly put his arms around him. Almost immediately, Newton clutched back at him, and Hermann held him close as he cried into his shoulder.

"I’m so, so sorry," he whispered, and cried with him, apologizing for all the things he had done, and all the things he hadn't.


End file.
